Burning
by ForeverinMoonlight
Summary: -DW7- In the end, it all catches up with him.


_Disclaimer: I don't own the Dynasty Warriors fandom. Really. I just write fanfiction._

**A/N:** Ages ago I wanted to write a fic about Cao Cao, and I'm glad I finally managed to do it. ..I'm still not entirely happy with this final result to be honest, but I had fun at least trying to 'get' Cao Cao's POV, anyway. Oh! Something I should mention: this was written with DW7 in mind, so there are **spoilers** for the Wei story mode here (almost all of the way through). And the son of Cao Cao that features in this fic is Cao Ang... just in case you're not sure about that later.

* * *

**Burning**

He had always been brilliant.

..'What arrogance!', you say? .._Oh no_. 'Arrogance' implied conceit – inferred excessive and ill-placed assurance of your own capabilities. He however, was under no such delusion.

'Confidence'.. That was the word. _That_ was what Cao Cao possessed. An accurate description.. and that _confidence_ was nothing but well-founded.

_He had always been brilliant_.

No pretension. Just belief. It was fact – difficult to deny, that he was one of talent; of skill; of intelligence and charisma.

It was not up for question in his mind, for his past was ever evidence in itself.

_Yes._

Brilliant. He was brilliant – a brilliant, _brilliant _man, and..-

_So was his ambition._

..Ambition.

Of course. Completely natural – a brilliant man ought to have brilliant dreams – but that wasn't the point.

_Ambition_.

No pretension here; no lies. He was fully aware of it.

Cao Cao was an ambitious man. Desire and drive like a searing flame, emanating so brightly from him that it might as well _personify _him.

Never had a day gone by when that ambition had been absent.

It had fast become.. fitting. He, who had such _ability_ – that was not in doubt, and he should not _be _in doubt.

It was as a blaze – he felt it burn; brilliance, just like himself. So strong that it might be intimidating to a lesser man, but _he_ was Cao Cao.

_This_ was power. Raw and also the promise of more – if he could but utilise it. And he could. He _knew_ he could – he would, because it was all so _clear_.

Clarity. That was what it brought. Clarity, and a torch to light the way. _He could see it. _He could _ sense _it, the sheer drive.. _Smell it_, that alluring scent stretching into the distance.

His eternal beacon – just like he would be, to the people and this ailing world. Chaos ravaged the land, cloaked and choked the air. Darkened survival and prospects.. Yet _he_, Cao Cao.. His brilliance _was _enough to cut through it.

Undoubtedly.

His path could be nothing else.

.._Time to start forging it._

Motion was easy. With his fervour and drive and that ardent ambition he could not and _would not _be stopped.

Move.

_Move_.

Move..!

_Get out of my way!_

Resistance was expected but _not acceptable_ – they _didn't see_.. this was the only way that the chaos could finally be got rid of. _Cao Cao _was the only one capable of banishing it.

Momentum. Momentum and momentum. _Burn _on and on.

Don't stop.

_Don't stop._

..Especially when the road was.. troublesome. _Especially_ then. Obviously.. Such irritations had been accounted for. They were bound to occur, but if you were as collected and ingenious as Cao Cao was, most damage could be effortlessly averted.

Nothing would dampen his spirit. _Nothing _would dampen that ambition, roaring inside – order would be made reality when it was all his!

_There was no stopping. Not now._

His vision, fixed on the goal and that better future that he would create, could only grow ever closer.

_Moving.._

Closer..

_And closer.._

Ambition..

_Growing..-_

Oh-so-brilliantly...

…

(..Yet..)

_Ah._

Here's the drawback. What a beacon you are, burning so brightly there was no room for anything else – what a beacon you are, yet what use can you be when they are following another? _What a beacon you are_.. Yet...

Such light

_Blinding light_-

_That path.._

Could he really _see?_

...His vision.

(_His ambition_.)

Nothing else.

His vision, unyielding, like himself – fixated and stubborn and _uncompromising _because that was _necessity_.

Yes.

_...No _regrets_._

It was only.. natural.

He was as steel – cold steel, to control that inner fire.

He had _accepted _that. That was.. responsibility. Nothing could be compromised in order to realise his brilliant, brilliant ambition... _Not even himself_.

_Keep moving_.

He would not stop. Strength was needed to endure all the fire, but he was not lacking in any.

_Though he _burned.

It _burned_

_It all _burned- And he-

_Yes... _He...

Despite his constancy.. Despite the steel and the composure and his calculating plans and _that... _ambition.

(The fire.)

_He..._

_..Was.. _Tiring.

Or was it simply that he was slowing?

Slowing, so that everything else was catching up with him?

_..It burned._

No.. Not that ambition – not really.. Little left alight in his ageing eyes, scant torching and contorting... Most escaped and gone.

Though he felt the fire, still... _Those _flames, as they _burned burned _burned at Chibi.

...He remembered everything.

_No regrets.. little ambition,_ but everything else that was overdue.

That was what haunted his dreams, now. All those ghosts. .._Too real._ Realer than they had been back then, somehow. More vivid, now that his pounding head was looking around.

_(The true drawback.)_

When the flames were dimming, and the light didn't care enough to see leagues into the future..

_There was the damage._

The aftermath.

_The loss._

The loss that had not been given even a second glance.. Festering, he realised, in the face of his deliberate, calculated neglect. A wound gone untreated for so long, and how it...- how _he_...

_Ached_, from it.

If it was not _that battle_ (and the aftermath of that inferno when his footfalls thudded thudded _thudded_ like the battle drums long ago like his heartbeat thud thud _thud_ like his footsteps thud thud.. _thud_.. _thud_.. Heavy – like the crushing shock of defeat _crushing_ him raw from the blaze so far _out_ of _his_ _control.._? But a moment but _thud thud thud _a grip like a vice his head struggled even now..-), there were plenty other echoes able to spring upon his attention.

Blackness.. Darker than the spots upon his vision, and a sheer void into his heart. _That _terrible_ night_ bleaker every time it was recalled – memory upon memory-

Foresight blinded for _failure _to settle in – _trapped_, cornered? But the insult merely rankled beside the more cutting events that had come – sacrifice upon sacrifice in a display of heroism and tragedy.

Two major pieces swept from the board – though of course, the pretence had eventually thinned out, now buckling, _buckling_; shuddering at the force of what gaped behind it.

Cao Cao _felt it_, like he had never known the meaning of it before.

_How could he not..?_

His son. Sweating face set in inspired, solemn determination before the finality of his duty. Cao Cao had been hurried but the pride had _surged_ despite everything (my son.. a _Cao till the-_), even if the grief was only too quick to clinch and eclipse it.

They had been blocked out, but he could _imagine_ the sounds of that clash, and of course he had no need to conjure up the silence – the premature (empty) silence (_absence_) that had haunted him every day in the background since.

And Dian Wei...

Larger than life and lost to death, but _Cao Cao remembered_. He closed his eyes and his treasured bodyguard stood, taking every. Single. Hit arrow after. Arrow. _Punctuated_ split second after split second...

..Piercing..

And _still_! Still Dian Wei had not fallen, not in life, but in _death _he could plunge _endlessly.._.

...-

Never an end. Not to this. _Not _to _this –_ or perhaps there was just that much to catch up on. Loss. _Loss _like you wouldn't believe.

_His price to pay._

He was in no doubt. He had never been in doubt, about _that_. His ambition was brilliant, even _purifying_, but stand too close to the fire and you will _get hurt._

Foe.. and friend alike.

It had been... _All _been...

_Necessity._

(His lips tugged into a smile.)

(_Bitter_. So vacant – more so than even the one that had adorned Xiahou Yuan's corpse.)

..It still.. _hurt_.

Yuan's laughter reverberated in his dreams, ghostlier than all the other deceased put together. Recognisable, but inexact to his memory and intangible.. Just out of reach.

Missed terribly.

A ruse and a plan that had sealed Guan Yu's fate – an exhibition of his usual brilliance, but the closer _spirit _that had been _snuffed out_ that day...

It had indeed dampened his own, bile rising in his throat, the _loss_... cavernous.

_How _he had kept moving after that...-

_Hah. _No. He was incapable of anything else. He was not one to ever travel _backwards_. Though he was forced to admit..

His path did not stretch on much further.

His sight ahead was dying for a reason.

(There was not much left _to_ see.)

..Only a fool would describe the world as 'slowing down'. It was his own pace that was increasingly leaden, now, as he started to drift at the same time.

(_Not long_.)

Confined to rest in his room, exhaustion was his constant bedfellow. And yes.. _Finally_, he had not the energy – not the _will _left to attempt to outrun or dishonour this pain any longer. However blatant a _weakness _this was... He was..- No, he _chose to be.. _engulfed by it.

_He opened his eyes, and drank the tidal wave in_.

Just this once.. There was no true fire left to be quenched, not any more. Nothing left to drown, that wasn't already emptying.

_He felt._

(Ambition now aside no more pride only _accomplishment – sadness_emptiness_nostalgia_caring_painso_much_PAIN_joy_and_grief _everythinginbetween_...-

However.)

Not a single regret. As ever.

_Never _any regrets.

He had rejoiced and he had mourned (_oh _had he _mourned_).. He had made easy choices, right choices, _difficult _choices (_agonising_ choices) but nevertheless – _here _was the _unforgivable _thing:

_He could not regret it. _One bit, despite it all.

He would do every last thing again.

Burn and burn and burn... and _burn for_ it, if necessary.

(..Or.. Was that actually _his ambition_ talking? Still?)

_Hah.._

(No matter. If any yet smouldered, the sparks would die along with himself.)

…

Perception was stark, even as it faded. Thoughts started to dwindle.. His feelings, a drying stream. Any brilliance, soon to be ash.

_No regrets._

Thankfulness, certainly. Like all else, it was about time that was acknowledged.

(_"Xiahou Dun – I couldn't have done it without you. Thank you."_)

(My fierce, brilliant friend.. Loyal, to the very end.)

_No _regrets, but a nod to that barren, _barren _guilt. The long-held truth he could _finally_ stop denying.

(_"Dian Wei, I can finally tell you I'm sorry... Xiahou Yuan, forgive me..."_)

(Reality is finished. Let us walk, side by side again, in our dreams.)

And possibly.. the warmth of _hopefulness_, even as he plunged, down.. _down_.. Into that greatest, most unknown void of all.

_Death itself_.


End file.
